Oh No! PCLinuxOS In Trouble!!! March 30, 2009

I just read (in Distrowatch) that PCLinux is going through an internal split. For a long long time, PCLinuxOS has been my favourite one-CD distro. In fact, the only reason why I stopped using it was because I got bored by its stability. I wanted something new and tried other distros in its place. But I always intended to return. And while I was really excited about the new PCLinuxOS 2009 release, I delayed installation because I was waiting for the perfect time to install it (to replace my current Linux Mint distro). (I have a lot of non-Linux work that I need to finish before I can start enjoying Linux again). But what I read in Distrowatch was a shocker.

Basically, to summarise, a whole bunch of developers have left the PCLinux distribution over differences with the leadership. PCLinux is one of the many closed-community Linux projects, that are run by a particular team devoted to the project (as opposed to community driven projects).

While it’s not surprising that there would be internal rift, this news couldn’t have have come at a worse time. PCLinux is hardly established in the public psyche (unlike Ubuntu), and could do without such negative publicity. This was to be an amazing year, with the new release and all. But in effect, now, this news will only dissuade people from trying out this excellent, I would say the best, one-CD distro. Sadly, to an extent, even I now hesitate to try my waiting-to-be-installed PCLinuxOS distribution.

Internal issues have rocked the world of PCLinuxOS, with numerous developers quitting the project. The issues appear to have started when project lead, Bill Reynolds (Texstar), took a year-long break from running the distribution and left the distro’s primary system administrator, Solis, in charge. Without input from the project founder, development of PCLinuxOS 2009 by the community continued but just before release, Solis halted it so that Reynolds could overview it. The release was then delayed two weeks while it was finalised. It appears that many developers were not happy with the way this was handled and have consequently left the project.

JMiahMan, former admin of the PCLinuxOS hardware database and developer of EeePCLinuxOS, voiced his dismay at the announcement: “Not hearing from Texstar for more than a year, development [by the community] continued, then the moment before release passwords were changed on servers and suddenly Texstar is back and now not only halting the release, but saying all the hard work the community did for a year wasn’t good enough. That’s leadership suicide.” More information is sure to come to light as former developers switch to other projects.

In related news, Derrick Devine, former administrator of the community project site MyPCLinuxOS, recently handed over control of the project and announced work on a new Linux distribution, called Unity, with many of the other former PCLinuxOS developers: “What it will be is a new Linux distribution that takes an incremental approach to desktop Linux. It will provide a central core and use the mklivecd scripts that PCLinuxOS uses and it will provide a base from which to build just about any desktop you want out there.” Currently the distro is being developed behind closed doors, but more information should come to light soon. Either way, it is clear that no animosity exists on the side of former PCLinuxOS developers, who remain grateful to the distribution for everything they have been able to achieve over the years. Derrick continues: “You won’t hear us say anything bad about PCLinuxOS, its leadership, or the direction it is going. We are very proud to have been members of the PCLinuxOS community… some of us for almost six years. Nothing can take away our gratitude.“

I have been using pclos since 04 and have always been very pleased with it!
it was the distro that finally let me break free of Windoze!
and in my opinion a lot better than Ubuntu
I do hope everything works out for them :)
and I hope Texstar is well and over any health problems!
I am using and enjoying 2009.1 on about 8 machines at the moment..
and as ever.. I am VERY pleased!
thanks go out to everyone that has helped to make such a great distro!!

True enough. Tex has pretty well given credit where credit is due. I have to give it to him that when people were thanking him for the 2009.1 release he was telling them not to thank him but to thank Gettinther and the Ripper Gang.

“The delay was due to some people making decisions on the final product without considering the opinion of other team members.”

Decisions were made on a majority basis among the developers and when one person didn’t like the decision, that person took over. The developers responded by leaving.

“The entire team did not leave PCLOS. There are 6-7 people on the development team. They make it sound as though there we many.”

Of those 6-7 people on the development team, 2 had minimal contributions to PCLinuxOS 2009 and calling the third a developer is quite laughable. All the other people -those who *actually did work* on PCLinuxOS 2009- left.

Anybody who has followed PCLinuxOS development in the past year and looks at the Unity forums will see that pretty much everybody who was somebody with PCLinuxOS is GONE. They are now with Unity.

I am no expert on Linux..
but on voluntary teams.. well lets say I have some background :)
these sort of things are bound to happen!
TBQH I believe PCLinuxOS will continue with or without those dev’s
it has a life that is larger than the development team.. and even more.. it has a vision!!
I recentl built a new PC. quad core with 8GB of memory..
so I thought I would go through some 64Bit distro’s frankly it was a disaster!!
none where stable!
none had that elusive something PCLinuxOS has!
a something that means that when I turn on my PC I KNOW what I am getting into..
I know how it is going to work.. and indeed that it IS going to just work!
I then decided to sacrifice 4MB of RAM and use a 32Bit OS
Ubuntu worked quite well but the font sizes and other bit’s are not too clever.. and I preder KDE to Gnome :)
Kubuntu was a disaster! plain and simple! KDE4? not yet thanks!
Mandriva was the biggest surprise!
every time I used the package update system.. it broke something usually majorly!!
the same sadly applied to Suse! (and those both shocked me)
we won’t even discuss the problems I had with DesktopBSD (for fear of upsetting someone :) )
so yes.. I am back to PCLinuxOS on this machine too!
it just works!
the updates are generally rolled out in a way that does not break anything..
it is fast and friendly!
I have put it on freinds and families machines.. and have had no hassle!!
something that I can’t say about many other things including windows!
Unity looks like an interesting idea.. but it is unlikely to apply to me any time soon!
so I wish PCLinuxOS a long and happy life!!
and I hope they get themselves sorted out!!
it is the ONLY distro I recommend to anyone leaving windows for Linux… and it hasn’t failed me yet :)